Breaking Routine #3

So we did it! In January we officially tired three new recipes! Here is the most recent!

-

-
Yesterday we tired a new recipe for baked french toast that I found on my aunt's blog HERE. We both really enjoyed this recipe! Yummy toast with the crunch of pecans. As usual we halved the recipe, but that was the only deviation we made! You can find the recipe at Marsha's Kitchen, along with all sorts of other goodies that we may have to try!
-
Chris - Thumbs Up!
Kelli - Thumbs Up!
-
Now we just have to narrow down some choices for February!

Going Gray

Welcome to "The Blue Room"

-

-

Our guest room has been refered to as The Blue Room since we arrived. It was the previous owner's boys room and is a very little boy blue room.

-

-
A little room with a twin bed, random boxes and part of a TV. Time to give this room a new color and make it truly serve its purpose.

-

-
So we are going gray! Dutch Boy's Eco Gray to be exact. All the tim will get a fresh coat of Dutch Boy's Ultra White. Because the walls will be lack of color, the intention is to add accent colors around the room... To start I picked up sample colors of four Pittsburgh Paints - Willow Herb, Tapestry Teal, Madeira Red and Love Potion. The plan is to incorporate them into some DIY wall art for a punch of color. But that is down the road so back to business!
-
-
For starters the make shift closet. Now I can appreciated some of the work around the house that the previous owner had done, but most things were done in a lackluster way. Take note of this closet. First, this closet is not original. This room used to be larger but then someone decided to put in an additional closet in what is now the master bedroom. Then they left this little nook in the guest room, and converted it into a mini closet that has left a lot to be desired. Take note that the finishing does not go all the way to the ceiling, nor did they finish it to the floor.
-
-
So the plan for this weekend was to simply paint this room. We ended up ripping our the closet and then thought we would fix all the mismatched baseboard as well, so we tore all of that out. We are those people who can't just do a simple painting project, we will find other things to fix!
-
-
My next job was to remove all of the nails from the old baseboards. Tideous, but necessary. On the upside, surprises can be found in even the most mundane tasks.
-

-
See this. I don't know if I have mentioned this before, but our house turns 100 years old this year! So while we were ripping off baseboards, we came across some that were original and on the back of one was a shopping list.

-

-

Okay back to the original task of the day. Let's help this room go gray!

-

More updates to come!

Breaking Routine #2

Well we decided to give another new recipe a try this weekend! What do you feed a guy how only likes meat and starch? More starch! You disguise other food groups as cheese and sauce... so I decided to try and make one of Chris' favorite recipes: Stuffed Manicotti!

-

-

I used the recipe I found HERE. Using advice in others comments here is what I changed, I used an Italian blend cheese instead of the Monterrey Jack, and I added some basil and garlic powder to the cheese mixture. We only cooked half the package of noodles (simply because we are only two people and that's a whole lotta noodle!) and we only cooked them for four minutes, they were super easy to stuff - simply put mixture in a ziplock bag and snipped a tiny whole in the corner - squeeze to fill!

-

I cooked mine covered for 30 minutes, then removed the cover and baked another 10 minutes. I wanted a darker cheese, so I broiled it. I do this often, the only issue is that I get distracted very easily (too many shiny things) and the cheese always gets burnt. Oh well. I am happy to announce that this is the first success of the year! Might not be pretty, but sure was yummy!

-

Chris - Thumbs Up!

Kelli - Thumbs Up!

Embracing Obsessions

Last weekend was a very productive weekend of working on resolutions, so I thought I would take some time to work on another one. Embracing Obsessions. As I explained a few days ago, spending a night at home watching movies, isn't very unusual for us but those circumstances were different.

-

In all reality, we can be found most nights on the couch watching TV, especially during the Winter months. I will usually have my computer out working on stuff for work, and Chris has full control of the remote. So I wanted to take some time and share what we like to watch and some of our favorites.

-

When it comes to TV, these are our current favorite shows.

-

-
The Big Bang Theory is really the only show that we actually watch on "TV" besides football - we only have very basic cable. All of our other favorites we stream instantly through Netflix. We love that we can watch seasons/series at one time, we are not patient people... waiting a week in between episodes doesn't always appeal to us! So our current favs on Netflix are Prison Break and Weeds! Love 'em!
-

-
Here are some of our old favorites! Buffy is a classic for us and we love watching her whooping the bad guys. Along that line is Spartacus, this is actually one of my favorites ever! In our family, I am the blood and guts loving girl, the more grusome the better! I'm disturbed like that... And probably our favorite show to ever watch together was Lost, we were big fans and we didn't even start watching until after Season 5 was released on DVD.
-
-
Following along the lines of TV watching, I thought I would take a minute to share what our favorite movies are. Above are Chris' top three picks. We watch a ton of movies at our house, but The Punisher is his favorite (hence his pumpkin from this year, found HERE). His movies all seem to have a comic book theme going on, and that's because we seem to watch a lot of them. I tend to put up a fuss, saying I don't want to watch another one, but in the end I usually like them more than he does.
-
-
These are my favorite movies of all time! Dramatic, I know... The Shawshank Redemption is as good as it gets for me. Violence. Drama. Thriller. Tear Jerker. Though Provoking. Doesn't get much better. (Plus it has Morgan Freeman, my fav!) The Fox and the Hound always makes me cry, I've loved this movie for as long as I can remember... and The Ringer, of course. This movie makes me laugh every time and I absolutely adore it, oh mylanta!
-
Chris thinks my top three make me seem "sweeter" than I am. Meaning that he thinks they don't show my dark side, so I thought I would mention that following The Ringer, my runner ups include: 300, The Condemned, Death Race, Dawn of the Dead and any of the Final Destination movies... Sounds cruel, but they are all very near the top of my favorites list.
-
Now that I've given you and inside look into one of our obsessions, I hope you'll share some of your favorites with me? Any movie that you could watch over and over again? Is there a show that you never miss on TV? Do you use Netflix? If so, what do you watch? Any suggestions, we are almost done with Prison Break and Weeds?

Decluttering Begins

So when we gave ourselves the task of decluttering, we started thinking about not only things we could get rid of, but also items we might be able to sell. So I decided it was time to say goodbye to my embroidery machine.

-

In most households, you may be correct if you choose cars, furniture or entertainment items as the most "expensive" items around. Not in our household, it was the embroidery machine that sadly was rarely ever used! So we figured it should be sold to someone who will use it a lot to make lots of gifts for their loved ones.

-

Gladly, we succeeded with this task!

-

-

We were able to sell this beauty to a lovely lady Chris works with, who was extremely excited to get a great deal (she must be frugal like me)! We not only got rid of the machine, but everything that went with it! So we cleared out one entire desk and half of a cabinet too! Yay for decluttering, and also working on resolution #5, saving moolah!

-

We love it when one action helps with another! More decluttering tomorrow!

-

Please excuse the mess behind the machine... that is a project for another day!

Breaking Routine #1

One of our new year resolutions is to break our meal routine. I don't know what happens in your house, but we generally have a meal "rotation". We seem to eat the same things over and over again, one because we know we like then and two because they are usually simple!

-

Let me just say this; I am not a cook. I love to bake and tend to bake fairly well, but cooking is a whole different story. So we are making an effort to try three new recipes a month in 2011.

-

Let me introduce, Breaking Routine #1.

-

-
Being that the boy is a meat and starch man, I figured we would stick to the meat catagory. Whenever we make it out to eat, especially to Perkins, he orders Country Fried Steak, one of his favs. I have tried this once in the past, but the recipe was not good. So I decided to attempt it once again, following a recipe from a well known cook, The Pioneer Woman.
-
Using her recipe for Country Fried Steak from her cookbook I lead the charge and hoped for the best. Following the recipe to the max, things were not going so well. My cooking instincts are not great, but after cooking them for much longer than stated, I knew this was not going to go well.
-
I am very sad to announce that our first attempt at breaking routine was an epic fail. The meat was not done and the gravy tasted of far too much flour with no other recognizable flavor.
-
We are bummed, but will not let this effect our opinion on the great ranching housewife. We will remain fans and maybe try another recipe that this year. We are stealing a rating from my aunt's blog (found here) and will both give our opinion on the new dishes this year with a simple thumbs up or down.
-
Breaking Routine #1
Kelli - Thumbs Down
Chris - Thumbs Down
-
Wish us better luck for next time!

Long Week

This has certainly been a long week! First we get snow on Monday and we break the snowblower, then to top it off I end up with the flu! No fun...

-

-
So yesterday I got a call at work, and to start the weekend off... the boy decided to officially ask me "out" on a date. Now, understand that we ended up staying in, but this is the first time in seven years that he has called and "asked me out"... BIG DEAL!!!
-
Started off thinking we would go out for chinese and then to a movie, but after seeing the movies that were playing we decided to get our food to go and rent movies for a night on the couch! In most cases this would not be a rare occassion but after a long week, it was just what was needed!
-
Good movies, great food and amazing company. What a way to kick off the weekend! See you soon!

Slacking...

Sorry this site has been so boring, I will update this weekend with some 2011 Resolution progression! Promise!

-

Weekend Focus:

1. Declutter

2. Breaking Routine

3. More Time Together

4. Acknowledge Obsessions

-

Be sure to check back later! Happy Friday!

Clearing the Rumors

Haha, just wanted to throw out a quick post to clear up any misunderstandings... no, I'm not pregnant. There have been lots of emails, texts and phone calls since my last post. Sorry to burst any bubbles! Nothing yet!
-
I will fill you a few posts from now... but essentially, one of my 2011 resolutions is already paying off, literally! Stay tuned!
-

FYI, when there's a "baby post" I will be much more creative :-D

Bitter Sweet

I thought it would finally be time for me to display one of my holiday decorations. Last summer at an auction, yes the one that did THIS to my garage, I ended up buying a box for some fancy-shmancy dishes and ended up getting a couple old doilies. Wondering what to do with them, I browsed the internet for doily projects. And feel in love with one!

-

I have been grabbing spare doilies from everywhere all year! Friends, grandma, garage sales, thrift shops, surprisingly - they are very hard to find! Finally I had enough to do for now...

-

Then I got an idea for a great new table! So I waited and waited, as patiently with little toe tapping as I could for the hubby to help with the table. Two weeks before Christmas, I burst out one night, "Will the table be done for Christmas!?" The answer was no.

-

So, I decided that my doily project would have to go on my not so pretty table... fine. I'll suck it up! {But I'm not going to be happy about it...}

-

-

Meet my sad, old, plain, veneer topped, metal legged, yawn table... sigh... okay, pity party over, let's jazz her up!

-

-
Here are the said doilies mentioned above, and the only other supply I needed... floss!

-

-
First I laid them out on the table, in a fashion that pleased me... not hard to do with all that white and creamy crocheted happiness!
-
-
Last, you tie the delicate beauties together and snip off the extra floss... are you ready!?
-
-
Pow! One super schnazzy doily project all dressed up for Christmas! Now imagine a big bouquet of flowers in the spring or a pumpkin and acorns in the fall... woo hoo, multi-use project. {Would be even better if the boy would help me with my table project. Honey, I hope you're reading this, love you!}
-
The title is "Bitter Sweet" because I insist this project would have looked better, but in reality I love it so much, I could care less what table it was on!
-
Next step, add more doilies as I find them and turn it into a full table runner, with homemade gorgeousness flowing over the edge of the table! Like the one I found that sent me on the doily mission this summer, you can see it HERE (you may have to scroll through some of the photos in the bottom right). Did you find it!? Love it!
-
My sincerest apologies for all the "excitement" in today's post, I'm in a GREAT mood and I'll explain it all very soon! No, it's not the table :-) Happy Thursday!

Wednesday Wishes

Once again, Happy New Year to all! I wanted to start off Wednesday Wishes for 2011 with something that I really wished I'd had last week. Some of you may know that Chris & I don't do Christmas cards, we do New Years cards - essentially because I am not punctual enough.

-

So last week while I was getting them all ready to go, I was wishing that I had an address stamp for us! So that is when I started looking and look at what I found!

-

-

Note Trunk is an Etsy store! They have a bunch of amazing address stamps that are to die for! Then have a variety to choose from and and they are all reasonably priced under $30 (from what I saw). Take some time to browse through their store if you have the time, you can find them HERE.

-

Otherwise, take a peek at some of their designs below. Most are available in a wood stamp or self-inking. One of these will be on my list of things to purchase in 2011! Enjoy!

-

-
-
-

-

Resolutions...

I have debated whether or not to post these for the last few days, but have decided that it would help me to keep them if they were public. So here are my 2011 resolutions.

-

Image Source Here

-

Number One : Date Night

-

We are officially implementing a date night each month. A night/day for the two of us, doing something specifically together out of the usual. This is normally not an issue in the summer months, or once it gets nice enough to go outside, but during these winter months – many nights are spent on the couch with a computer and Netflix… how romantic. So to kick things off in January we treated ourselves to an afternoon out for ribs at the Hitching Post, ice cream and home to play Yahtzee.
-

Image Source Here

-
Number Two : Breaking Routine

-

Chris is very excited about this one! Chris grew up with an amazing cook (his mom) and ended up marrying me, the queen of Hamburger Helper! We have a “rotating” meal plan, essentially we cook the same things quite often… Chris would really love it if I would try experimenting some more… so here is the plan: Three new meals each month. Shouldn’t be too difficult, but considering that we can be a picky eaters (lots of meat and starch in this household) and that fact that I don’t care much for cooking, this will be a chore! But we are looking forward to cracking open the cookbooks and calling on loved ones for recipes we’ve wanted to try!
-

Image Source Here
-
Number Three : Organize the Chaos

-

Chris and I are not much for housekeeping, but we really enjoy a clean house. So this year we will focus on creating organization out of the chaos. We have plans for areas of function that are still appealing to the eyes. Making sure that basic household chores are handled will also be a part of this step... darn it, I don't like cleaning.

-

Image Source Here
-
Number Four : Remove Clutter
-

We have a large house, very large considering we are only two people. While we have the room for all of our stuff, I have realized, we have a ton of stuff that we DO NOT NEED. So I am going to set this goal to declutter my house of this unnecessary mess to help with Resolution Three. For example, as stated, we are two people and there are five laptops in this household, why? Cause one could go down? Emotional attachments? They were gifts? Haha, for whatever reason, this number will be decreasing!

-

Image Source Here

-
Number Five : Saving Moolah
-
We are armed ourselves with some money saving techniques and have vowed to work on increasing our savings account this year. With the house, a car and the wedding this past year, our savings took a hit. So this year we will focus on replenishing our nest egg, but remember to enjoy a few planned purchases along the way! More on those to come this year!
-

Image Source Here
-
Number Six : Project Follow-Through
-
There are tons of things to do on my project list, just ask the hubby! The issue can be that I get halfway through with one project and then get sidetracked by another, especially if shiny objects are involved - very distracting! So I am going to try my hardest to ensure that once a project is started, it is seen through to the end. In addition, some of the larger projects involve time to save pennies, implementing Resolution Five and more time to convince the boy that they are necessary (insert evil grin here). So to help with the follow-through, I will make an intentional push to share all of our projects, big and small on the blog.

-

My Image
-
Number Seven : Out & About

-
This year we will make an effort to get out more. In addition to date night, we will plan a couple adventures. Whether it be a geocaching excursion or re-implementing the “girls” road trip that got trumped by the wedding in 2010. Chris has never been to the ocean, so that may be on the horizon. We have family throughout this great nation, maybe it is time for a visit and some sightseeing. Maybe the answer is a weekend trip to the big “cities” with family for some splash time fun or another visit to the snow hill. No matter the decision, it is sure to be a blast.
-

Image Source Here
-
Number Eight : Acknowledge Obsessions
-
This is one that we started working on a little early, but will be a big part of 2011 for us. This year we will learn to acknowledge and embrace obsessions. Hi, my name is Kelli and I am addicted to thrifting and white spray paint – I am married to a man who is passionate about video games and firepower, but insists the ammunition and intense practice will all pay off when the zombies attack.
-
My Image
-
Number Nine : Embrace Life
-
While this may not seem like a typical resolution that can be checked off a list, but it is something that I need to put in writing. I have to work on taking life by the horns. We do not need to adhere to anyone else’s rules (well with the exception of anything that could land us behind bars)! Just because someone else structured their life in a certain pattern, does not mean that we need to carbon copy that pattern in hopes of achieving the same results. So we will learn to embrace opportunity, change and make mistakes! We won’t be afraid of dreaming (Chris), but we will take it with a dose of logic(Kelli).
-
And because we make our own rules, there are only nine resolutions, not ten - or it could be that the creative juices have stopped flowing… take your pick!
-
We wish you all a very happy new year and hope that you will continue to check in to see all of the exciting, and mundane, paths we hope to follow this year.